The losses of D David Carle (heart condition) and F Stepan Novotny (major-junior) have trimmed DU’s incoming freshman class to four. Question is, will the Pios add more players?

Probably not, according to DU assistant coach and recruiting coordinator Steve Miller. Carle will attend DU and keep his scholarship, and Novotny’s full deal likely will be invested among current walkons, Miller said.

In my mind, Novotny’s loss isn’t that big a deal. He was asked to think about deferring his deal until 2009 because of the program returns 11 of its top 12 forwards, and you know No. 1 recruit Joe Colborne is going to be among the top 12, so the Pios are going to be just fine up front.

In addition to Colborne, who went 16th overall in the recent NHL draft to Boston, the Pios add C/W Nate Dewhurst and Colorado native Luke Salazar. Like Colborne, Dewhurst will be on a full-ride and will have every opportunity to play. That means 13 guys, including 11 with experience, will battle for 12 spots.

So Novotny, in my mind, was expendable. He could have been one of those young, talented kids that need a ton of ice time to gain confidence … a work in progress. But without him, the team will put more experience out there.

The bigger question is what to do without Carle? He could have been the team’s top offensive defenseman this season. Miller says a healthy John Ryder and fellow sophomores-to-be Jon Cook and Joey Brehm will give the team a chance to have reliable depth.

The top six D-men will be seniors JP Testwuide and Patrick Mullen, junior Cody Brookwell, Ryder, sophomore Chris Nutini and freshman John Lee. Senior Julian Marcuzzi, Cook and Brehm will provide depth.

Certainly no Aaron McKenzies, Ryan Caldwells, Brett Skinners, Matt Carles or Chris Butlers in the mix, but I’m told Ryder and Lee could become good two-way players at this level. We’ll see.

I’m working on a historical Joe Sakic story that led me to Lorne Frey, who was the assistant coach and GM of the Swift Current Broncos when Sakic played there from 1986-1988.

I got a bunch of good stuff about Sakic from Frey, now the assistant GM of the Kelowna Rockets, and then we talked about Frey’s current WHL team — which has some interesting University of Denver ties.

The Rockets recently drafted forward Stepan Novotny, who signed a letter of intent with DU, and was originally pegged to become a Pioneer this fall, but then deferred for 2009.

Frey confirmed that Novotny — who played part of last season for the renowned Shattuck-St. Mary’s prep team — that the Czech native is going the major-junior route.

“An agent informaed us about (Novotny), so we ended up drafting him,” Frey said. “We’ve talked to him and he’s coming.”

This was also confirmed Wednesday by DU assistant coach Steve Miller. “He just thought it’d be better to go to the Western League,” Miller said. “It’s dissapointing to lose a player of his caliber.”

Novotny probably didn’t like the fact that DU wanted him to play another year in junior-A — primarily because the Pios return 11 of their top 12 forwards.

“We talked to him about the depth of the forwards and where he would fit in,” Miller said. “At the end of the day if he wanted to come to Denver he was going to come to Denver. With that said, we talked about waiting another year, and in the end he thought it’d be better for him to go to the Western Hockey League.”

Frey and I also talked about the Shore brothers of Denver, both of whom are DU prospects. Drew Shore, who played last season for the U.S. under-17 team, is comitted to DU for 2009, but was drafted by the WHL’s Chilliwack Chiefs. Nick Shore likely will follow his brother at the U.S. under-17 team in Ann Arbor, but Kelowna owns his draft rights.

Frey hinted that both kids are intrigued by major-junior and will have tough decisions. According to one of my Front Range youth sources, Nick Shore will pick between the Rockets and DU, but his decision might sway where Drew ends up. In other words, both kids likely will play major-junior or NCAA, but not one in each.

Miller can’t comment on the Shores because DU hasn’t signed either. But from what I’m hearing, Drew will be a Pio in 2009 and Nick — who will begin his freshman year of high school — will say no to the Rockets next year and don a DU sweater in 2012.